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Murder is everywhere, even in Dublin… That’s why there’s a Dublin Murder Squad!

What is the Dublin Murder Squad series?

American writer Tana French is the First Lady of Irish Crime, it’s strange when you say it like this, but the author of the Dublin Murder Squad actually lives in Dublin.

And so, she writes about the police detectives on the murder squad in Dublin, Ireland. Each book has a different primary character, but with the exception of the first one, the lead had been introduced as a secondary character in another novel before.

Dublin Murder Squad books in order:

You can read them in publication order, but it is not an obligation. It is sometimes recommended to read “In The Woods” and “The Likeness” later in the series. Reading them together is better, but the first one is the most divisive book in the series. So, you can pass them to go to “Faithful Place” or “Broken Harbour”. Your choice !

In The Woods – In a small Dublin suburb in the summer of 1984, three children do not return from the dark and silent woods. When the police arrive, they find only one of the children gripping a tree trunk in terror, wearing blood-filled sneakers, and unable to recall a single detail of the previous hours. Twenty years later, the found boy, Rob Ryan, is a detective on the Dublin Murder Squad and keeps his past a secret. But when a twelve-year-old girl is found murdered in the same woods, he and Detective Cassie Maddox find themselves investigating a case chillingly similar to the previous unsolved mystery.

The Likeness – It’s six months later and Cassie Maddox has transferred out of the Dublin Murder squad. But an urgent telephone call beckons Cassie to a grisly crime scene. The victim looks exactly like Cassie and carries ID identifying herself as Alexandra Madison, an alias Cassie once used as an undercover cop. Suddenly, Cassie must discover not only who killed this girl, but, more importantly, who is this girl?

Faithful Place – Back in 1985, Frank Mackey was a nineteen-year-old kid with a dream of escaping his family’s cramped flat on Faithful Place and running away to London with his girl, Rosie Daly. But on the night they were supposed to leave, Rosie didn’t show. Frank took it for granted that she’d dumped him. He never went home again. Neither did Rosie. Then, twenty-two years later, Rosie’s suitcase shows up behind a fireplace in a derelict house on Faithful Place, and Frank, now a detective in the Dublin Undercover squad, is going home whether he likes it or not.

Broken Harbour – Mick “Scorcher” Kennedy plays by the book and plays hard. That’s why he’s the Dublin Murder Squad’s top detective, and that’s what puts the biggest case of the year in his hands. On one of the half-abandoned “luxury” developments that litter Ireland, Patrick Spain and his two young children have been murdered. His wife, Jenny, is in intensive care. At first, Scorcher thinks it’s going to be an easy solve, but too many small things can’t be explained. And this neighborhood — once called Broken Harbor — holds memories for Scorcher and his troubled sister Dina: childhood memories that Scorcher thought he had tightly under control.

The Secret Place – Stephen Moran has been waiting for his chance to join Dublins Murder Squad when sixteen-year-old Holly Mackey arrives in his office with a photo of a popular boy whose body was found at a girls’ boarding school a year earlier. The photo had been posted at The Secret Place, the schools anonymous gossip board and the caption says I KNOW WHO KILLED HIM. Stephen, joins with Detective Antoinette Conway, reopen the case.

The Trespasser – Detective Antoinette Conway teams up with Steve to resolve Aislinn Murray’s murder. There’s nothing unusual about her—except other detectives are trying to push Antoinette and Steve into arresting Aislinn’s boyfriend, fast. There’s a shadowy figure at the end of Antoinette’s road. Aislinn’s friend is hinting that she knew Aislinn was in danger. And everything they find out about Aislinn takes her further from the glossy, passive doll she seemed to be.

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